The Fine Art of the End Frame

Anthony Soprano sits with ailing Pie-O-My at the the end of episode 5, series 4.

As long form television emerges into a new dominant art form, it tends to glisten with fleeting moments of mastery. And we’re able to replay and still these poetic, semiotic moments on LED edge-lit canvases (TVs) to examine them. This end frame from episode 4 of series 5 of The Sopranos is reminiscent of a painterly masterpiece, and if you’re intimate with the story arc of Anthony Soprano, it’s so full of pathos it justifies the association far beyond the wonderful composition.